Saudi banks trial blockchain-based identity technology at ATMs — Computer Weekly — “The Saudi Arabian trial will enable local consumers to use their faces and blockchain-based apps to withdraw money from cashpoint machines instead of PINs. The ID authentication prototype, currently under test, can communicate across banks and uses blockchain to confirm an individual’s identity without accessing the bank’s database.”
Pilot
Crédit Agricole pilots biometric bank cards
“Mastercard is working with Crédit Agricole Payment Services on a biometric card pilot for 200 customers in Touraine and Poitou, who will trial the card which features an integrated fingerprint sensor... More
Decathlon to introduce scan and go to all stores in the Netherlands
Customers at sporting goods retailer Decathlon in the Netherlands who don’t want to line up at a physical checkout can now simply scan their goods, pay and leave — without setting off alarms — thanks to the introduction of a mobile self-checkout solution... More
Luxury watchmaker Vacheron Constantin combines blockchain with QR codes to counter fraud
Swiss luxury watchmaker Vacheron Constantin is to use blockchain technology and QR codes to create forgery-proof digital certificates of authenticity for its watches which can be easily transferred to new owners... More
Paris to switch on NFC mobile ticketing for bus, tram and metro services in September
Commuters in the greater Paris region will be able to use their NFC mobile phone to store Navigo transit passes and T+ prepaid ticket books from September 2019... More
NFC cool chain pilot tracks avocado and berry pallets across borders
Members of the Cool Chain Association (CCA) have completed a pilot test of an NFC-based solution to the problem of how to monitor refrigerated fresh produce in transit to ensure it has been maintained at the correct temperature and will still have a good shelf life when it arrives in stores... More
Mexico pilots national NFC and QR mobile payments system
Mexico’s central bank Banxico has begun trials of its cashless QR and NFC Cobro Digital (CoDi) electronic payment system with employees of financial institutions including BBVA Bancomer, Citibanamex, Santander, Banorte, Banregio and Fincomun... More
ScotRail pilots pay-as-you-go rail ticketing
ScotRail is running a trial of pay-as-you-go rail ticketing which enables travellers to load money onto a smart card and use it as a ticket on the company’s trains. The best fare is deducted directly from the card when the traveller taps out of the station at the end of their journey. More
Shenzhen Metro tests face recognition payments
You will soon be able to pay your subway fare with your face in China — South China Morning Post — “At the Futian station, instead of presenting a ticket or scanning a QR bar code on their smartphones, commuters can scan their faces on a tablet-sized screen mounted on the entrance gate and have the fare automatically deducted from their linked accounts.”
NatWest Bank to trial contactless biometric card
NatWest Bank is to run a trial of fingerprint-on-card authentication allowing a cardholder to make contactless payments above the current level of £30... More
Lloyds Bank to pay retailers to offer cash withdrawals to customers
Lloyds Banking Group announces pilot scheme to boost the number of retailers offering cashback — Lloyds Banking Group — “There are tens of thousands of local high street shops which have the infrastructure in place to offer a cashback service but may not see it as a viable option — especially without a purchase — as they do not receive a fee for providing cashback… We need to make it more viable for them [to] offer cashback to all customers, whether making a purchase or not.”
Banco de Mexico to pilot national mobile payments service
Mexico pushes mobile payments to help unbanked consumers ditch cash — Reuters — “Mexico’s new leftist government is betting on financial technology to help lift people out of poverty… It is planning a digital payments system run and built by the central bank that will allow Mexicans to make and receive payments through their smartphones free of charge. A pilot roll-out for the platform, known as CoDi, is expected by March.”
Blockchain mobile payments pilot to go live in Mongolia
Blockchain firm Terra to launch instant remittance, lending services in Mongolia’s capital city — e27 — “The pilot programme in Nalaikh City will launch with two main features: peer-to-peer (P2P) payments to allow instant transfer among users of different banks, and mobile payments to build the infrastructure for secure, contactless payments… The programme is set to launch within the next six months.”
ABN Amro rolls out wearable payments on rings, watches and bracelets
Customers of Dutch bank ABN Amro can now connect a wide range of Mastercard-certified wearables to their bank account and use them to make both standard, low value contactless payments and also, by entering a PIN at the point of sale, higher value transactions beyond the contactless limit as well... More
UN agency to pilot biometric cards for migrants
International Organisation for Migration chooses Tactilis card for pilot programmes — Tactilis — “The pilot activities will evaluate the concepts, performance and viability of biometric system-on-card technology when deployed in three different migrant and foreign worker environments, namely visa card, cross border card and migrant camp card. There are close to 260m migrants globally, with 75m of those across Asia, many of whom are undocumented or displaced and require resettlement with trusted identity credentials.”
EU citizens report bugs in UK government NFC passport reading app
People taking part in the pilot test of an NFC app developed by the UK government to make it easy for EU citizens to apply for settled status following Brexit have reported a number of bugs, including multiple issues related to NFC passport scanning... More
PNC Bank to offer dynamic CVV cards to commercial customers
PNC Bank is piloting dynamic CVV cards that use an e-ink screen on the reverse of the card to display a continuously updated three-digit CVV security code... More
Intesa Sanpaolo pilots contactless biometric payment card in Italy
Italy’s Intesa Sanpaolo bank has announced Europe’s first pilot test of a contactless biometric payment card... More
7-Eleven pilots mobile self-checkout in 14 US stores
Convenience store giant 7-Eleven is piloting a mobile self-checkout service in 14 stores in the Dallas area, just two months after it began accepting contactless and mobile payments across its 8,000+ US stores... More
Commonwealth Bank to test ‘smart money’ that knows what it can be spent on
Australia’s Commonwealth Bank is to pilot a new type of ‘smart money’ that can be pre-programmed with a set of conditions that define what it can be spent on, who it can be spent by and when it can be spent... More